So I know I’m not treating you all very well at all. I’m actually afraid to look at my stats because i know they’ll have gone down the drain again. But I swear I’m not doing it on purpose, and I’m not slacking either. I just have a day job.

You see, [...]]]> 13/02/2012 Update

So I know I’m not treating you all very well at all. I’m actually afraid to look at my stats because i know they’ll have gone down the drain again. But I swear I’m not doing it on purpose, and I’m not slacking either. I just have a day job.

You see, a big part of my job is Bids. That means, about six or seven times a year, a really really big bid comes along, and I suddenly find myself working 50 – 60 hour weeks. I’m at home now, writing this, but I’ve also got a USB stick with me that has a ton of work for me to do tonight on it. It’s tiring, stressful, and time consuming and leaves me with no time at all to work on my darling comic.

This particular bid is over at the beginning of next week. After that I’m hoping to take a few days to recuperate and work on my comic. I’ll be back and it shall be glorious!

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This took FOREVER.

A historical note: Valenciennes lace was exceedingly expensive during the 18th century. A pair of ruffles (which took ten months to make) would sell for 4000 livres. This website chronicles its history: http://belovedlinens.net/lace/valenciennes-lace.html. Note that it was never really used extensively by the aristocracy, so I’m bending things a bit (again), but I was too taken in by the (probably untrue) story that it was made in cellars so dark its workers went blind before they were thirty. True or not, Valenciennes lace was a complete pain to make, and I’m hardly surprised it never made a proper come-back after the french revolution.

This is half an update. The other half shall be tacked on asap!

For interested parties, Kate (of Widdershins, as usual) and I have worked out our con schedule for this year. We’ve confirmed the first half of the year – London and Manchester. There’s no small press expo this [...]]]> An Update. Resa and Maren. And a Hatbox which totally isn’t important to anyone but Maren. Totally.

For interested parties, Kate (of Widdershins, as usual) and I have worked out our con schedule for this year. We’ve confirmed the first half of the year – London and Manchester. There’s no small press expo this year, so I’m afraid nothing is scheduled for March. If you’re desperate for pretty things though, there’s always the shop. If any of you are considering purchasing something, I’d just like to point out that it does help me quite a bit, even just with covering the costs incurred by using Big Cartel. I will post more preview pictures of the changed art on Chapter 1 in a couple of days, for those of you who want to know more about what you could be getting in your post box!

For those of you who want to know what happened to the gift art, I’ve moved it over to my tumblr for the time being. I suppose I need an art site for things like this eventually, but that’ll do for now.

I’ll be trying to get a second update in this week but if that’s possible remains to be seen. So see you either later this week or next Monday morning at 8.00 am GMT.

Christmas was lovely. I got to spend two weeks playing with a giant Irish [...]]]> A day late, but here we have the last of the gift arts, the fabulous, glorious, Delilah Dirk by the grand Tony Cliff. If you haven’t read it, you’re missing out. If you don’t plan to, you’re a fool!

Christmas was lovely. I got to spend two weeks playing with a giant Irish Setter puppy. His name isn’t Clifford but it really should be.

Next week we should be back to our regularly scheduled updates. I should also have time to go back and shade the two images I didn’t have time to!

For the sake of story, I’ve messed with how the french nobility shopped. A noblewoman going to visit a shopkeeper was rare indeed. Instead, the craftsmen went to visit them, presenting samples of their work. The finished items were then sent back to the [...]]]> Edit: There we are, the shades are finally up.

For the sake of story, I’ve messed with how the french nobility shopped. A noblewoman going to visit a shopkeeper was rare indeed. Instead, the craftsmen went to visit them, presenting samples of their work. The finished items were then sent back to the estate, without the noble ever being so much as slightly inconvenienced. But Maren’s got her reasons for shopping.

….Poor alphonse.

edit edit. I’ve cleaned up the gift art for the sake of continuity. They can currently be found on my tumblr until i find a better home for them. New update goes up tomorrow.

A welcome to anyone who has found me via the Forbidden Planet International piece on Thought Bubble! Some very lovely things were said, both about my comic and my clothes.

I must also apologise, as today’s comic is rather (gasp) anachronistic. Not much more so than swapping out all [...]]]> Hooray hat shops.

A welcome to anyone who has found me via the Forbidden Planet International piece on Thought Bubble! Some very lovely things were said, both about my comic and my clothes.

I must also apologise, as today’s comic is rather (gasp) anachronistic. Not much more so than swapping out all the people from the 18th century and replacing them with my own, but we must draw the line somewhere! While the building did exist, it didn’t exist for another fifty years or so, and it was actually a hair dressers, not a hat shop. I made some alterations to it visually to fit into the 18th century architectural style, but its lines are still that little bit too clean for it to actually fit into its year. I liked the building a little bit too much to ignore it, however, so we’ll simply all have to pretend that some architect in Curia Regis was thinking well ahead of his time. Doubtless he was told he was mad.

Edit: Sorry for the lateness on that. It took rather longer than expected. I also found out that I am missing four completed pages for Chapter 1 – I only have WIPs. As a result I have quite a lot to do by Monday, and you’re unlikely to get an update next week. I’ll [...]]]>

Edit: Sorry for the lateness on that. It took rather longer than expected. I also found out that I am missing four completed pages for Chapter 1 – I only have WIPs. As a result I have quite a lot to do by Monday, and you’re unlikely to get an update next week. I’ll post previews of the merchandise for the convention instead!

The updates are getting even smaller! They’re shrinking! aaaaa!

No, no, just kidding, I just didn’t have time to do the rest of the page, but I didn’t want to leave you hanging for another week. I should be able to get the rest of the page done either tonight or tomorrow night after work, so think of it as two updates! Yes, that must be it. I’m actually giving you extra, not just being awful.

In the mean time, I’d like to direct your attention to a links change on the left side of this post. I’ve swapped out Kate’s old comic for Kate’s new comic, the glorious Widdershins, which I’m very excited about. Second down the list is ‘Mis-’, a stunning new addition for those of you who like adventure of the super variety. It’s in its beginning stages at the moment, but I very much feel it’s worth reading from the very start!

So go enjoy those, then come back tomorrow morning, and I should have the rest of an update for you!

EDIT: 22/10/2011:

Hi all. Although I tried to get a comic update done before I leave for germany tomorrow morning, this has turned out to not be a possibility. I hope to only skip one update here, but as it’s my birthday next weekend, we’ll have to see how that works out. Rest [...]]]>

EDIT: 22/10/2011:

A day late, but here it is. In colour too! I’m still trying to settle on what I want from this comic.

Some fantastic news, Darken – Kate’s comic (first link on the left) is over. So if you want to read a complete, long-form fantasy comic with mad-cap adventure and grand stories, then go read that! Then, on Monday, her new comic, widdershins, will be starting. If you like this, you’ll love that.

A note on history:

Candle Auctions, or Auction by Candle, were a popular way of auctioning off large lots of property by ‘inch of candle’. While more popular in England, the practice also spread to France in the 18th century. Information on 18th century auctions is surprisingly rare. I own one of the few books that is fully about auctions, not just where auctions are mentioned slightly in passing. It’s called ‘A History of the Auction’ and was written by Brian Learmount. It’s a fantastic little hardback that tells some grand stories about auctions. One of my favourites is the story about Rome where, in 193 AD, the entire Roman empire was put up for sale by the Praetorian Guard. There were two bidders, and the story is described in great detail by Edward Gibbon in the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. If you’re curious about that, you can find it on project Gutenberg.

I could chatter on about this for pages and pages – I am shockingly well informed about auctions now, but I will spare you! A closing note, however – the auction poster on the previous page is also based on a combination of real auction posters for large lots. In case you were wondering!

Edit: There’s a reference on this page – anyone recognise Lot 665?

Some new bits and bobs include four lovely links to four lovely people down the left hand side of this post. Kate (right there at the top) is especially lovely and we attend cons together, so I especially recommend her. [...]]]> See? An update! Regular as clockwork. The clockwork of a really broken clock.

Some new bits and bobs include four lovely links to four lovely people down the left hand side of this post. Kate (right there at the top) is especially lovely and we attend cons together, so I especially recommend her. She will be my table partner again at Thoughtbubble this year

Some other con related news: the UK Small Press Expo that I’ve attended for the last four (five?) years is cancelled this year. This puts a bit of a kink in my March plans, but will allow me to be far better prepared (hopefully) for May, in time for the MCM expo. This year I will absolutely not miss the two seconds in which it is possible to sign up! ABSOLUTELY. So if you’re going to be around Leeds in November, or London in May, remember you can find Kate and me in all our merchandising mode glory!

For sneak peaks of upcoming merchandise and drawings, or for any questions you’d like to ask, remember to click on the tumblr above!